News

• August 19, 2021

  Tshay Williams, Director of WITH MY OWN HANDS, will Play this year at BlackStar Film Festival

  Tshay Williams is a filmmaker and screenwriter who focuses on making portraits that celebrate Black lives. Williams has worked with a number of community-oriented media organizations including BlackStar Film Festival and Scribe Video Center. She is in development on her debut narrative short WITH MY OWN HANDS.

• August 19, 2021

  Tshay Williams, Director of WITH MY OWN HANDS, is the Recipient of the Forman Prize

  Tshay Williams is a filmmaker and screenwriter who focuses on making portraits that celebrate Black lives. Williams has worked with a number of community-oriented media organizations including BlackStar Film Festival and Scribe Video Center. She is in development on her debut narrative short WITH MY OWN HANDS.

• August 19, 2021

  “Kiraiñia,” a Documentary Film by Juan Castrillón, was Awarded the Honourable Mention by the International Council for Traditional Music as part of the ICTM Prizes 2021

  This ethnographic documentary focuses on the kiraiñia, a long flute from the Cubeo musical culture, and the rich cultural heritage of the indigenous communities in Vaupés, Colombia. The film poses questions about the preservation and revival of disappearing music via personal narratives and deconstructing colonial ideology.

• July 1, 2021

  2021 AAPI Artists Support Grants Announced

  We are happy to announce the grants awarded from our recent call for proposals - for projects led by or primarily serving Asian, Asian American, and Pacific Islander (AAPI) artists and practitioners within the Penn community. We are supporting fourteen projects, which represent a diverse collection of practices and are being led by a wide range of Penn community members including five individual students and one student group, four alumni, three staff and one faculty member. 

• June 8, 2021

  Turning an Archaeological Practice on its Head

  Penn’s Megan Kassabaum, takes a wider view that spans both time and geography by focusing on understanding widespread practices. Since arriving at Penn, Kassabaum has focused on tracking the long history of Native American platform mounds in the eastern United States. In her new book, “A History of Platform Mound Ceremonialism: Finding Meaning in Elevated Ground,” Kassabaum conceives of a new analytical approach, one that’s forward-facing rather than backward-looking. That leads her to reach a different conclusion about platform mounds.